The Western frontiers of Pennsylvania were sorely distressed during the spring and summer of 1781 by the efforts of General George Rogers Clark, an officer of the Dominion of Virginia, to raise troops for an expedition in the interest of Virginia against the British post at Detroit.
Clark received a commission as brigadier general and was given ample funds with which to purchase provisions in the country west of the Allegheny Mountains. Also a small force of 140 Virginia regulars was placed at his service and he was empowered to equip additional volunteers in the border counties.
Agents were sent in advance of General Clark into the country between the Laurel Hill range and the Ohio River, who began to buy flour and live cattle. This caused much uneasiness among the Pennsylvania militiamen stationed in that country, and Colonel Daniel Brodhead made complaint to the State Government.
Colonel Brodhead received a letter from General Washington directing him to give aid to General Clark’s undertaking and to detach from his own force the field artillery under command of Captain Isaac Craig, and at least a captain’s command of infantry, to assist the Virginia expedition.
General Clark arrived on the Pennsylvania frontier March 3 and established his headquarters at the house of Colonel William Crawford, on the Youghiogheny, spending part of his time with Colonel Dorsey Pentecost on Chartiers Creek.
It was generally known by this time that all of Virginia county of Yohogania and much of the counties of Monongahela and Ohio, claimed as part of Virginia, really belonged to Pennsylvania, but the actual boundary line had not been surveyed west of the Monongahela River.
Among the settlers there were many factions, some who would only obey the laws of Pennsylvania, and who declared that Clark was a Virginia officer and had no business in Pennsylvania; others adhered to Virginia authority until the line should be permanently settled. A few took advantage of the situation and refused to obey either government saying they did not know which had authority over them, and they had enough to do to plant and keep their rifles in readiness for the savages.
Clark intended to raise a force of 2,000 men. When he arrived at Colonel Crawford’s he learned that the frontiers were being raided by bands of Shawnee from the Scioto, Delaware from the Muskingum and Wyandot from the Sandusky.
An expedition against those tribes would be more popular among the Western Pennsylvanians than a campaign against distant Detroit, and Clark very adroitly made an ostensible change in his plans. He gave it out that he was going against the Ohio savages, for the immediate benefit of the Westmoreland frontier, but his real design to conquer Detroit was not altered.